{"id":1765,"date":"2019-04-10T13:02:22","date_gmt":"2019-04-10T17:02:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/itp.nyu.edu\/adjacent\/issue-5\/?p=1765"},"modified":"2024-10-08T21:20:50","modified_gmt":"2024-10-08T21:20:50","slug":"death-of-the-hologram-the-life-that-comes-next","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/itp.nyu.edu\/adjacent\/issue-5\/death-of-the-hologram-the-life-that-comes-next\/","title":{"rendered":"Death of The Hologram & The Life That Comes Next"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Death of The Hologram & The Life That Comes Next<\/h1>\n\n\n\n

By Or Fleisher<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

An exploration of recent innovations in 3D technology and how these developments will change our perceptions, our relationship with screen-based media, and what we call realistic<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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The uncanny valley <\/em>is a term coined by Jasia Reichardt<\/a> in her book Robots: Fact, Fiction, and Predi<\/em><\/a>c<\/a>tion<\/a>. <\/em>In aesthetics, the uncanny valley<\/em> is a hypothesized relationship between the degree of an object\u2019s resemblance to a human being and the emotional response to such an object (Karl F. MacDorman & Hiroshi Ishiguro<\/a>). This idea is perhaps best suited to describe not a phenomenon, but an era, which I would argue we are transitioning out of.
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This era I speak of began as early as the 1980s, when popular cinema and television began depicting holograms of the future. These transparent blue figures have had a great influence on our perceptual model of what holograms \u201cshould\u201d look like. Nowadays, innovation in machine learning, computer graphics, and hardware are paving the way for holographic content to become mainstream, and, yet, some of the questions I still ask myself are: Why are we so obsessed with realism? What is the archival benefit of documenting humans in 3D? What is the connection between holograms and personal assistants?
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\"Hyperreal
Image credit: AlteredQualia \/ Branislav Ulicny Uncanny Valley WebGL experience<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Our lives are surrounded by interfaces, apps, physical signage, and, more recently, voice interfaces such as Amazon\u2019s Alexa and Google Home. These interfaces are meant to serve a specific function in our day-to-day lives, but more often than not, they look, feel, and sound nothing like us. When we emphasize function instead of speculating over imitative visuals, we will most likely avoid that uncomfortable \u201cuncanny valley\u201d feeling. With more and more demand for computer-generated imagery (CGI) in recent years, and the popularization of platforms such as augmented and virtual reality, computer games, and interactive filmmaking, it is clear that there is potential for new human-computer interfaces that also resemble us visually.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In order to attain this level of \u201crealness\u201d for our smart assistants, companies and artists are exploring various forms of 3D capturing meant to replicate the human element in new and compelling ways beyond two-dimensional pixels. These tools form the basis for volumetric capturing, a collection of techniques used to capture three-dimensional humans.
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These volumetric capturing techniques have arrived in a variety of ways. Some are the result of a product vision, \u200asuch as Intel\u2019s Replay technology for 3D sports replays<\/a>, which engage sports fans in a new way by allowing them to replay a move from different angles. Others are born from computational aesthetic explorations, such as Scatter\u2019s Depthkit<\/a>, which was initially developed in order to create CLOUDS<\/a>, a volumetric documentary about creative uses of software. One thing they all share is the visual, technical, and aesthetic exploration of how to represent and document real humans in 3D space.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Image credit: Intel TrueView<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

During my thesis<\/a> research at ITP<\/a>, I focused on the possibilities of using machine learning to reconstruct archival and historical footage in 3D. The idea of using machine learning was born out of a desire to look back into more than 200 years of visual culture (i.e. 2D photography) and speculate about how to bridge the growing gap between 2D and 3D.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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